SMEs managing their own marketing are all too often led down the social media rabbit hole. We are all aware of the time-wasting abyss that social media can be on a personal level, why is it assumed to be different for business?
Often the SMEs focused on marketing their businesses via these platforms won’t be making a solid return on investment, if any at all. While you may see engagement on these platforms, it takes an often underestimated, sustained investment to convert that audience to customers.
While it can be valuable to establish an online following, the key is capitalising on that audience to turn engagement into sales.
There are several, often missed, opportunities that SME owners and marketers should consider. Here are some tips to consider alongside your marketing communications:
- Audience or customer?
The first step is to ensure you know your customer and then you know your audience. Audience does not equal customer. By understanding both groups of people your chances of converting an audience into a purchasing customer increase dramatically.
Then consider your communications with them. There is proven merit in email communications, which is often overlooked in favour of Twitter or Facebook accounts. The conversion rates for email are much higher than that of social media; 40x higher than just Twitter and Facebook alone, according to McKinsey & Company.
- Build a base
Step two of the customer lifecycle is to build a base of potential customers. Convert your social media audience to an email subscriber base – to do this you have to prove yourself with the content you’re putting out, and ask your followers to sign up. Many email platform providers offer Facebook apps so you can sync your database from Facebook seamlessly.
- Master the subject line
Once you have that base you have to ensure your email communications are effective and relevant.
Getting permission to email your audience doesn’t mean you’re in. In fact, just hitting their inbox can lead to rejection. Try to look beyond list size and emails delivered: the first step is getting your email opened and you only have a few seconds to get your potential customer’s attention. A true relationship can only be built when your audience is engaged, which means reading your content and clicking through to your online destinations.
Look through your own inbox and note what encourages you to open an email, and more importantly what doesn’t.
- Add a C to AB testing
Many SME owners and marketers will have heard of AB testing – the key here is to not allow the automation to take over. Understand what you’re doing when testing emails, and what converts to a sale. Click-to-open-rate (CTOR) divides the number of clicks by the number of opens, telling you what percentage of those that opened your email clicked through to the website.
For example:
- Email A has an open rate of 40% and click though rate (CTR) of 3.5%, meaning 8.8% of those that opened your email clicked through to the website, that’s your CTOR.
- Email B has an open rate of 30% and a CTR of 3%, meaning you have a CTOR of 10%.
Opens are primarily driven by the subject line, clicks by the quality of your content.
Most would assume the higher opens and clicks of email A mean it’s the best option. In fact, there is a good chance that your email platform would agree and settle for A, but ideally you want the subject line of email A with the content of email B; 40% open and then 10% CTOR, generating a CTR of 4%. The difference between a CTR of 3.5% and 4% could equal a 14% increase in sales!
- The three U’s
Undelivered – be sure to act on undelivered email. During the sign up process ask for more than just an email. If you get bounces or undeliverables use another touch point to keep the lines of communication open – sometimes it’s as simple as prompting them to update their email address, you can do this via SMS, over the phone or through traditional mail.
Unrequited – if your subscriber base is dwindling take a step back and look at your communications, and offer a preference centre besides the unsubscribe option. Perhaps their inbox is out of control – give your audience the option to receive fewer updates, or even offer to take a break, checking in again a couple of months later. Absence may make the heart grow fonder.
Uninformed – if it must come to an end, make sure you know why and use that information to better inform your future communications. Take stock of the feedback you receive regularly and incorporate it into your on-going strategy.
Optimising your emails using the above tips, and being open to feedback during all points of the customer lifecycle will pay dividends for those managing their own marketing communications.
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About the Author:
Melle Staelenberg, Business Manager – Lifecycle Marketing, Salmat
